


Devotion, Threefold

by anticyclone



Category: Original Work
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Cultural Differences, Deity/human, Human/God, M/M, Marriage, Marriage only means of saving one's homeland, Names, Wedding Night, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-04
Updated: 2019-07-04
Packaged: 2020-06-09 15:31:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,900
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19478815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anticyclone/pseuds/anticyclone
Summary: "You know," Aatenel said, lowering his voice, "most people who are graced with my physical form tend to say something in response."There had been a ritual greeting he was supposed to use, Pando abruptly remembered. It was like having water dumped on his head. He had fucked this up entirely.An unnatural fire threatened Pando's kingdom. The people of Vrae and his Expanse had never before demanded things from each other, so Pando had begged. He agreed to marry a fire god, sight unseen - only the wedding day has come, and the fire god does seem to enjoy what he's seeing now.





	Devotion, Threefold

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hoarmurath](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hoarmurath/gifts).



> I hope you enjoy this! (The end notes are a minor spoiler about names, I recommend reading them after.)

Meeting a fire deity did not go the way Pando had once assumed it might, a long time ago.

For one, he approached it in supplication. The people of Vrae and his own, the Expanse, had never before demanded things from each other. 

Vrae was a city-string spread out along the mountain range that capped the northeastern edge of the continent. The lower end of the mountains had temperate, agreeable weather. The further you climbed in height and in latitude, the snowier Vrael got. So naturally that was where they had stuck their capitol city.

"It's time to go, your majesty."

It was also proving difficult to convince the Vraens that in root tongue, 'your majesty' was redundant. None of them would simply call him Pando. "Of course, Honor Peyagh. Aster, Yarrow, are you ready?"

"That won't be necessary," the priest said, sniffing disdainfully.

This was the third interaction they'd had and Pando hated him already. He spoke Pando's language like it was a dead thing.

Pando forced a smile to his face. He would be courteous. "Aster and Yarrow come everywhere with me. They're my closest advisers and were present for all of the negotiations. They've spoken to Aatenel before."

Without them guiding him through the torturous process of nailing down the final marriage contract, he would have absolutely lost it and signed whatever Vrae demanded - or completely ruined things by storming out at the thirteenth demand he sign something in a language he wasn't yet able to read. Without them, this wedding probably would have taken place on the last summer solstice - which the god Aatenel had desired, but simply hadn't been possible. Pando had only been willing to concede so much. And then Aatenel had wanted to wait for the next solstice.

"This is a private meeting with his divinity," Peyagh said. "They are not allowed in the inner temple."

"Then they can wait in the outer temple."

"There is no outer temple." Peyagh sighed. "Your majesty, it really is time to be going."

Aster and Yarrow both assured him they would be there when he got back, and nudged him out the door after Peyagh. Aster murmured in his ear as he went, "This moment had to come eventually. You'll do fine."

Yarrow cleared his throat and said, rather more loudly: "I'm sure that Honor Peyagh will return you to us as soon as possible."

Honor Peyagh rather looked like he'd as soon never see them again, but he made a sound of assent.

It was freezing outside. Tiny white flakes drifted lazily down from the sky. Back in the capitol of the Expanse, Pando would have walked outside to find lush trees and verdant clover lawns. There would have been bees and butterflies.

But desperate measures were necessary when your entire kingdom was under threat of burning. A year ago the Expanse had lost its last ruler to a long illness. Pando had been called forth, confirmed by the appropriate people, and crowned in short order. And a few days into his first week as king, Els Chasm had erupted in a torrent of flame, devouring several villages. It had threatened to make its way across the landscape to the nearest city.

Nothing they'd tried had been enough to stop it, and the Expanse was long used to wildfires. Els Chasm was a cave system known to have spit fire in the distant past. There were poems about it, Pando had studied them as a child. No one was writing poems (yet) about what Els Chasm had done to the land around it.

They were calling what was left the Scorch, now.

The courtyard led to a staircase set straight into the mountainside, which curled around out of sight after the first several steps. Gray clouds rolled overhead. They cast everything in Thaniol in cold, storm-filtered light.

"How long should I expect to be up there?" he asked.

Peyagh's nose wrinkled. There were clearly still clergy unhappy with their deity taking an outsider as a husband. Tough luck. He hadn't been on the voting committee. "As long as his divinity demands, your highness."

Sighing out loud was rude, so Pando started climbing.

The stairwell disappeared into an opening carved in the mountainside. It was dim, and grew darker with each step, until Pando was slightly worried he was walking himself into a cave he'd get lost in. He touched a hand to the wall and found it warm. The stairs kept going until the murky sunlight was nearly gone, and then they kept going further - toward a rectangular seam of light at the top.

He knocked on the door and no one answered. There was no handle, but it pushed open when he pressed his palm to the wood. (Wood doors, in a fire temple?)

Inside was a large square room. No priests. No guards.

He'd half-expected some kind of altar in the middle of the temple, but the room was empty. Or rather the center of the room was empty. Along the edge was a low wall made of pale stone. The room itself was carved straight out of gray mountain rock. Inside the stone wall burned red fire, flames about as long as Pando's hand.

He walked to the center of the room.

Absolutely nothing happened.

And absolutely nothing continued to happen, until he felt silly waiting any longer.  _ "...Hello?" _ he asked, in Vrael.

His next surprise was that the fire god he'd agreed to marry, sight unseen, greeted him in his own language.

After spending weeks securing Vrael language lessons with the marriage contract, it threw him off to be greeted in root tongue, almost as much as it unsteadied him to be greeted by a voice that seemed to come from all corners of the room and from inside his own mind, his own throat, and from no living body that he could see.

"You came alone?" a voice asked, distinctly amused.

Pando blinked. He linked his brown fingers together and looked around. There was no one here with him. But that voice had been… too physical to be imagined. He cleared his throat and said, "I came to meet your searing divinity,  _ aat'l. _ "

A laugh filled the room.  _ "Aat'l.  _ Never thought I would hear that in your accent."

Feeling his face flush, Pando turned around. He saw only the doorway leading to the dark, empty stairwell. "You did request an alliance with someone of my accent, divinity. May your light be visible in the void," he added, hoping it made him sound slightly less irritated.

"Such a well-studied king," the voice said.

Was that mocking? Was he still mad about being kept waiting, so Pando could learn? It had cost him so much to ask Vrae for help. But a visit from two of their priests and from the god Aatenel himself - which Pando hadn't witnessed, personally, except as a glowing arc of light from several miles away - and the fires had been contained and remained so for the rest of the negotiations.

It was in the contract that the fire would be extinguished, permanently, once the wedding was over. Aatenel's voice - always speaking in Vrael, delivered through holy flame lit by his clergy - had said as much, several times. He and Pando had exchanged carefully translated sentences back and forth during a handful of meetings.

Pando realized that he was irritated, too. He looked at the flames. They reminded him nothing of the  _ searing grace  _ he'd been allowed to watch from a safe distance, last year. "Is there some reason for us not to meet face to face?" he asked.

"I have burned since the beginning," Aatenel murmured. "My worshippers like to travel. Sometimes they bring back traders. Visitors."

Pando said nothing. They'd never actually met. He didn't know what the god looked like.

Oh, there were paintings. The priests all wore little wooden icons somewhere on their persons. But the Expanse didn't worship corporeal gods and Pando secretly suspected there might be a level of worship in the depictions that wouldn't translate when they were face to face.

"I've never met Expansion royalty before. You aren't what I expected."

"Royalty of the Expanse," Pando murmured, gently correcting.

The flames flickered. "Isn't this what I said?"

"Expansion suggests consuming. The Expanse is not a conquering force. We simply occupy where nature allows us to."

A long silence stretched. Pando closed his eyes. He wanted to sit down. The room was overwarm and made him feel like he wanted to sleep. No. Like he wanted to  _ bask.  _ The floor was made of the same pale stone as the low inner wall, but the warmth beneath his feet was so inviting Pando imagined that he could comfortably spend days there. It was an unwelcome affinity. He'd expected to be repulsed by conversing with the god who'd demanded his hand in marriage.

During the past year he had also studied Aatenel. The god had been married before. He'd had to send people into Vraen cities to get him those texts, because his tutor had refused to provide 'silly entertainment,' but Pando had spent nights pouring over them.

Aatenel seemed like a deity who enjoyed his presence in the world, and taking a human spouse was a good way to anchor himself. It had apparently been several generations since the last one. The texts did mention that his spouses tended to be  _ blissfully exhausted,  _ whatever that was supposed to mean. Pando had never managed to figure out how to ask his tutor for a root tongue translation of that specific phrase.

"My apologies if I said something out of turn," he finally said, opening his eyes. "I-"

He immediately jumped back two steps before managing to stop himself.

The man in front of him smiled slowly. "You wanted to see my face."

He was shockingly handsome. Beautiful? Stunning? Pando had expected, insofar as he'd given it consideration, that a fire god would be red-skinned, or maybe orange. This man was a pale blue, though he wore an orange wrap around his shoulders and a red-gold tunic over loose red pants. His feet were bare. He had thick, wavy white hair that spilled loose onto his shoulders. Which were. Very broad. At his sides were large, strong hands, decorated with several rings and each with six fingers.

But the reason Pando couldn't look away was mostly his face. He had strong features and a large mouth, still curled up in that smile. His eyes were gold from edge to edge and had no pupil. It was an arresting way to be stared at.

"You know," Aatenel said, lowering his voice, "most people who are graced with my physical form tend to say something in response."

There had been a ritual greeting he was supposed to use, Pando remembered. It was like having water dumped on his head. He had fucked this up entirely.

"Were you not planning on revealing your physical form, divinity?" he asked, instead. It would sound stupid to use the greeting now. He tilted his head slightly and tried to look like he wasn't still shocked. "I have been waiting to meet you for over a year."

Aatenel smirked and took a step forward, halving the distance between them. "Whose fault is that?"

_ "It was my intention to greet my future spouse on an equal footing, my searing divinity,"  _ Pando said, lowering his head.

Aatenel took another step forward, so Pando had to stand up straight to keep from brushing up against him.  _ "That does sound good, in your accent." _

His tutor and several of his surprise visitors had all told him he spoke Vrael with a capitol accent, but protesting that to Aatenel's face didn't seem like a good thing to do. Also, the god's face was very close to his, now, and Pando was concentrating on looking steady and not like he didn't know what to do with that featureless gold stare. Or the fact that more of that inviting heat rolled off Aatenel's body, whispered that maybe it would be good to bask in, too.

_ "Why did you ask to meet me before the wedding?" _

_ "I have a question for you." _

Pando waited.

"As I said," Aatenel said, switching back to root tongue. "I've met peoples from the Expanse before. I've been hearing their stories for many years. It seems to me that their ruler is always named Pando. Even when their ruler is a queen. The queen before you was, too."

"It's tradition," Pando said, shrugging, holding his hands out. Not one that they would explain to outsiders immediately. You needed a little common ground, for that. He couldn't imagine ancient Expanse visitors readily sharing such information with a deity, not when the Expanse had no corporeal gods of its own. And no one had asked about that during negotiations.

"What was your name before you were crowned, your majesty?"

"Pando is the only name I answer to."

The god raised an eyebrow. "We're to be wed. I'm curious what you used to be called. You weren't crowned that long ago."

Pando hesitated, and Aatenel reached up to touch the side of his face. His hand was startlingly warm. Something must have shown in his expression, because Aatenel pulled his hand back and gracefully put another inch between them. The heat lessened somewhat.

He swallowed. He thought of the underground fires and the fields, forests, and towns that had already been destroyed. The people he had already let down as king.

This was a small thing to give, yes? Just one more small thing in a long line of them. Gods were strange. That was what everyone said. Gods who demanded symbolic wedding rituals in exchange for assistance were stranger.

He exhaled. "My previous name was Pyracantha."

Aatenel stared and Pando kept his chin tilted. The Expanse harvested its rulers from a root system of noble houses. If a child showed promise she was pulled into the royal order, educated appropriately, and watched. The next monarch was chosen by the previous with approval of a council. Pando had always been secretly fond of his childhood name. He wasn't supposed to have been. From the time he was young he'd been told that one day, if chosen, he would have to relinquish it for good.

It was ridiculous to assume that anyone from Vrae would be familiar with pyracantha, anyway. It didn't grow in rocky soil on unforgiving mountains. It wouldn't fare well in this cold land of a fire god, no matter its common name, which he had no reason to hand over. No one had ever used that name to refer to him.

Finally Aatenel breathed in. Pando realized that the god had stopped, for the last minute or so. The soft orange tongues of flame around the edge of the room wavered. The air above the low stone wall began to shimmer and the flames took on a steadily increasing tint of white.

He realized why Aatenel's hair was like that. And his skin - blue flame was hotter than white, wasn't it?

A bead of sweat trickled down the side of Pando's face. Aatenel reached up, swiped it off his skin with his thumb. Pando had to brace himself against the urge to reel back. The god's skin, on brief contact, had been nearly blistering.

Aatenel brought his thumb to his mouth and kissed the bead of Pando's sweat off his skin. His golden eyes drooped half-closed.

"Be ready for me in an hour," he said. His voice had a crackle underneath it that hadn't been there before.

It galled him to be dismissed. There was nothing for it but to swallow around the surge of sour feeling in his throat. Pando inclined his head just a fraction past what would otherwise have been unforgivably insulting, turned on his heel, and walked past the now-white flaming gate into the - pardon his language -  _ blessedly  _ cool stairwell.

The door swung shut the moment he took one step down.

***

The wedding did actually start an hour later.

Pando hadn't thought _that_ was what Aatenel met, but when he'd told Peyagh what his orders had been, the priest had dragged him off to get prepared. Which proved to mean being shoved into a tiny little room and brought various supplies to prepare himself for the ceremony.

Only Aster and Yarrow were allowed into the room with him. The rest of the retinue he'd traveled here with were getting ready for the celebration afterward. They hadn't brought many people. Enough to make traveling safe and some additional witnesses for the celebration. Pando would never be married again but this also wasn't a real wedding, it wasn't as if his family needed to be here. And Aster and Yarrow were his friends. They understood that this entire thing was more than Pando had ever expected to go through when he'd been crowned.

Yarrow cupped Pando's face in his hands and sighed. "You do look very nice, Pando."

Pando glared at him. Yarrow was his friend, he told himself. His very good friend.

"Hush. He's self-conscious," Aster whispered, her voice overloud in the cramped room. She was in a chair to the side, both hands resting on her cane. He wanted to glare at her, too, but glaring at Aster was a little dicier.

He had on a sleeveless blue robe and snug white pants. He hadn't been given a shirt, so the brown width of his chest and stomach was visible. The fabric was so thin that in any other part of the city, Pando would have said the priests were trying to kill him by hypothermia. But here, near what Peyagh had called the solstice temple, it was warm enough that both Aster and Yarrow had shed their coats and scarves as soon as they'd stepped in to help him dress.

Traditionally Vraen would also decorate their hair with gold wire, jewels, and flowers. But Pando's black hair was cropped close to his head, short on the sides and slightly longer on top. The long hair favored in Vrae was out of fashion in the Expanse.

A priest named Vahiol had delivered his wedding attire with a slight air of despondency. He'd brought a box of decorations for Pando's hair, but all Yarrow had managed to do was fix a gold wire around Pando's head like a crown. The wire had little flames fixed to it.

Pando batted Yarrow's hands away from his face. "Thank you both for your incredible moral support."

"We'll be here when you're done," Aster said. "And it didn't go so badly, did it?"

He sighed and nodded. There was nothing else to be done. Only the couple and the priests were allowed into Vraen marriage ceremonies.

Pando didn't consider that to much of a wedding, but he'd hardly cared enough to press on the specifics of that. A few vows exchanged, the promise of protection and of future offerings secured. Pando could be on his way and Aatenel would have both feet firmly in the mortal world for a little longer.

He imagined that a connection to a human from so far away might give the fire god more influence than the Expanse might want a Vraen god to have, but... It was too late for that. And they had tried on their own to put this fire out. There had been no more time left to spend. 

Besides, the gods of the Expanse were ancient, and they outnumbered Aatenel for all they didn't have humanoid bodies.

They'd been given a ten-minute warning nearly nine minutes ago. There was a knock at the door and the other priest, Vahiol, came in without waiting. He was younger and broader than Peyagh and seemed more nervous than irritated that his god was wedding an outsider. He gave Pando a once-over, his eyes getting sad around Pando's hair again, and gestured out the door.

"His divinity is ready to receive you."

***

Snow fell in a gentle dusting. The gray stone walls of Thaniol's buildings were shaded white. 

He'd been lead through the palace to a rooftop temple and could see most of the city from here. Between the time he'd looked out his bedroom window that morning and now, palace workers had streamed through the city hanging banners in the streets. From the rooftop the city seemed to ripple with blue fabric.

Peyagh urged him through the doorway into the rooftop temple. Pando expected a bracing blast of cold air and instead was so hot he wanted to steal one of the priest's folded fans.

This temple had another low stone wall around the edges, filled with flame, except this room was round instead of square. The floor was sleek gray stone polished to nearly shine. Pando kept glancing down expecting to be able to see more than blurry reflections in it. All of the people were smudges of dark color. The center of the temple had no roof, just a circle that looked up into the clouded sky.

The snow melted into nothing before it could drift through the open skylight.

Aatenel sat on a cylinder of stone at the opposite end of the temple.

"This way, your majesty," Vahiol said.

In the center of the room he knelt and put his hands on his legs. Vahiol draped a gauzy scarf around his shoulders. It was pale blue, nearly white. The priest arranged it just so, hesitated, and then made a quick adjustment to the circlet of wire decorating Pando's hair. Pando had to stop himself from smiling as Vahiol backed away, clasping his hands in front of himself.

 _"His majesty of the Expanse."_ Vahiol then turned to bow in Aatenel's direction and said, _"His searing divinity, hearthfire of the world, that upon which all relies."_

Pando wondered what it was like to actually worship a god you could see. Not that in the Expanse they couldn't see their gods - part of the whole worship thing was visiting the canyons, the caves, letting the winds and storms roll over you. One of the more notable cases was a tree-forest. Pando had been there before, many times. He'd been crowned there. But he couldn't see an expression on a tree-forest's face when he knelt before it.

Silently, Aatenel rose. He crossed the room.

Next was supposed to be a ritual blessing. Then Aatenel would ask for his devotion and make a vow of his own. Pando had memorized all the words months ago, he knew how it would go. He would also make an offering of a lock of hair (there was a priestess at the side of the temple holding a pair of golden shears who had done a double-take at Pando's appearance, and he'd had a very undiplomatic laugh to himself). Finally, they would kiss.

No, not finally. Finally: Aatenel would sign the contract with a date stating when he would travel back to the Expanse to extinguish the underground fire.

Instead of any of that, Aatenel knelt in front of him.

From the way the priests around them went rigid, Pando realized something was ... wrong. He concentrated on holding perfectly still. His palms were flat on his thighs and the stone was digging into his knees.

He didn't move his head and hopefully didn't let confusion or anxiety seep into his expression as Aatenel leaned forward, pressing their foreheads together, his hands coming down to settle on top of Pando's.

He linked their fingers together. His hands weren't as large as Pando had expected, for some reason. They were no larger than his own. Though there was the extra finger and the short nails, gently scraping against his skin.

 _"Did you think,"_ Aatenel whispered, that crackling in his voice, the popping of burning wood, _"that I didn't recognize the classical name for the firethorn tree, Pyracantha?"_

Pando felt every part of his body go still. "Ah."

Aatenel inhaled. The heat along the edge of the roof increased. A slight breeze twisted around them, heat desperately soaring up through the open ceiling to the sky above. Aatenel's hair shifted in it and Pando felt a bead of sweat slide across his throat and down under the blue scarf.

 _"I do like,"_ Aatenel confided, _"this human tendency for your eyes to get so black."_

 _"Pupils, you mean,"_ Pando responded, automatically. He nearly added that it happened in response to changes in light or emotion, like mind-numbing fear, except that a traitorous part of his brain added _and surprise, and lust,_ and he didn't trust his tongue not to say that part out loud.

He kept his voice so quiet that he could barely hear it himself. The god seemed to have no issue. Aatenel looked increasingly like the rest of the room didn't matter. Except it did. The air was near simmering and when Pando looked around the room through his lashes, the clergy looked near panic. None of them were close enough to have heard anything they'd been saying to each other.

 _"We should return to the ceremony, aat'l,"_ he whispered.

Aatenel's mouth curved in some kind of smile. _"At your insistence."_

He released Pando's hands and gracefully returned to his feet without any apparent effort or strain.

Vahiol immediately brought over two small wooden bowls full of wine. In light of the expression on his face his hands were remarkably steady. He didn't spill a single drop as he handed the bowls over.

Pando concentrated on emulating that as he balanced the small bowl in his palm. He looked at the blurry reflection of the temple in the dark liquid instead of whatever it was on Aatenel's face. It was just a name. It was just a plant. Just because it had caught Aatenel's attention didn't mean that there was significance to it.

 _"We are here today to welcome a new flame to the hearthfire,"_ Vahiol intoned. He backed away as both Aatenel and Pando sipped their wine.

A priestess, not the one with the scissors, walked up. Her name was Laryssa and her pale hair was piled high on her head, under a sheer orange scarf. She was the current head of Aatenel's church and had been at several of the contract negotiation sessions.

She reached down and gently placed two fingers under Pando's chin, tipping his face up so it was impossible to avoid looking at either her or Aatenel. She looked serene. Aatenel looked liked he was unwrapping a gift. Pando forced himself to exhale, slowly, as Laryssa began to recite the first words of their vows.

 _"In his searing divinity's presence we find shelter, wisdom, and life,"_ she said. She lowered her hand and both of them sipped their wine again. Pando made sure to raise his eyes afterward, though he didn't quite meet Aatenel's gaze. _"We provide the surface and the fuel for the fire and are lit from within. Though the world may be a void, his divinity's light pierces through it. Today we bind his light yet closer to our world and find ourselves enriched."_

 _"Welcome,"_ Aatenel said. _"With me, you will never go cold. You will always have a guiding light home. Your devotion will be returned to you threefold."_

Pando waited for his turn and reflected that, when all of this had started, the Vraen delegation had actually suggested he learn these lines phonetically.

 _"All flame belongs to the fire. All fire relies on its fuel. We breathe the same air and are one,"_ Laryssa said.

 _"We breathe the same air and are one,"_ Aatenel said, and Pando repeated.

Then it was his turn. The words crackled in his mouth. There was a small smile on Aatenel's face, but Laryssa didn't react, so he had no idea whether the feeling was audible to anyone else. _"With me, you will never go dark. You will always have a hearth in which to burn. My devotion will be everlasting."_

Together they drained the last of their wine. Peyagh appeared at their sides to wordlessly remove the cups. While he backed away, Laryssa made a gesture and Aatenel held out one hand, not so much assisting Pando to his feet as giving one gentle tug and Pando suddenly finding himself standing upright.

It might have been the wine or the heat of the temple but he felt slightly dizzy. Aatenel kept his hand wrapped around Pando's wrist.

 _"Though you may be parted, you will always be one,"_ Laryssa said.

Aatenel leaned forward. _"Husband,"_ he murmured, before pressing a brief kiss to Pando's mouth.

Pando shut his eyes until he pulled away. He tried not to think about how long it had been since he'd been kissed, or how long it had been since a kiss had felt like that. It was unfair to compare humans to gods. Also, ostensibly, he should be more excited about the fact that Aatenel was setting a date only three weeks out to travel to the Expanse and finish the work at Els Chasm. It would all be over soon. This was what he'd been working towards for an entire year.

This was why he was here, being kissed, in this temple to a foreign god.

The other priestess appeared to clip his hair - she did it very gingerly - and drop it into flame. It dissolved with a pop of light and no scent. A scroll was presented. After Aatenel's signature was on the contract, Pando wrote his own. He set down the pen and found his hand being clasped by one with six fingers.

Aatenel kissed his knuckles. _"I look forward to having you to myself tonight, Pyracantha."_ He said it like it meant something else, something other than merely a four-syllable sound people used to employ to call Pando's attention, slightly over a year ago.

The priests led him away.

 _"Tonight,"_ Pando echoed, to himself. Vahiol came over to take him back to the antechamber. He got about three steps before his brain ground to a halt and his feet followed a second later.

Wait.

What?

***

"I need to be alone with my advisers," Pando said as soon as they were through the door.

At the other end of the room Yarrow and Aster froze, placid expressions on their faces. The room must have warmed up since the ceremony began because both of them had shed several knit pieces, which were now piled on the desk in the corner. Both of them looked at the priest as if Pando's clipped tone was simply business as usual.

Vahiol hesitated, glancing back and forth between them. "But, your majesty, it is traditional to..."

Pando gave a royal and incredibly rude flick of his hand. He would have to figure out how to make up for that later when his brain was fully functional and Vahiol was not in danger of overhearing him panic. "My advisers can help me. Please return when dinner is to be served."

Vahiol bowed to all of them and left.

As soon as the door closed, Pando whirled around. "Yarrow, I thought this was supposed to be a symbolic ceremony!"

Looking at the blue scarf on his shoulders, Yarrow asked, "But wasn't it? Vraens are very into ceremonial clothing."

"He said he looks forward to seeing me later tonight," Pando ground out, rubbing his hands into his eyes. "Alone!"

"Who?"

"Oh, Peyagh, we really hit it off before. I'm into men who obviously hate me. Who do you think! Aatenel!" Throwing his hands into the air did not make him feel better, but it was emphatic.

Aster and Yarrow both looked at each other. Aster turned to pull out a bag of official papers, her own records, while Yarrow walked over and started pulling the 'ceremonial clothing' off of Pando, so he could get back into his own things. His own hands were starting to shake. He was probably just dehydrated. All he'd had since breakfast were those ritual gulps of wine.

To himself. What was that even supposed to mean? Pando had been willing to sign away his hand - it wasn't as if he'd had any looming engagements on the table, there had always been too much to do, even before the queen had died and he'd been officially crowned. He'd been willing to learn another language and travel all the way to this far-flung mountain range that somehow hosted a dozen cities. He'd been willing to get on his knees and pledge fealty to a god who could look pleased while he did it.

Oh, he regretted that thought. He shook his head to get rid of it and Yarrow flicked a finger against his hair. "Hold still."

While Yarrow unwound the scarf from his shoulders, Aster flipped through stacks of papers until she found the one detailing the ceremony itself. _"The ceremony will end in a consummation of flame,"_ she read out. She looked up. "We all assumed _consummation_ meant the kiss, or - did they make you stick your hand in a fire, or anything?"

"No."

"Arms out," Yarrow said. Pando raised his arms and he pulled the robe off.

"I spoke to several Vraen about this, when we drafted it. No one mentioned that our interpretation might be wrong." Aster's face creased. "Unless they all thought that by 'kiss' we were being unusually demure."

"I can take my own pants off, Yarrow," Pando muttered, shucking them. He wanted out of the white fabric. Yarrow rolled his eyes and handed him a much more Expanse set of lined gray pants, the kind he wouldn't freeze in once they were out of the temple. "I swear to the g-" he started.

Yarrow pointedly cleared his throat.

"I swear to my own apparently divine-by-association ass," Pando said, putting his hands down on Aster's table, "that if someone thought I was such a wilting flower that they couldn't explicitly inform me about ritual sex, I will walk into Els Chasm myself and let the fire devour me before Aatenel puts it out. Yarrow, please serve your future queen Aster-Pando well."

"I would give my life for her," Yarrow said, very seriously. "Please come back over here and put a shirt on. I'm sure your husband wouldn't want us gazing upon your half-naked form."

Aster worried at her bottom lip and didn't notice the promotion. She dragged a finger along the page, flipped it over, and flipped it back again.

"I'm going to kill you."

"You can't kill me, Pando. The Vraens burn their dead. My parents would be very upset."

"Pando," Aster cut in, before Pando could strangle his old friend. They both turned to look at her. She held up the paper and pointed at the bottom paragraph, as if it would mean anything from across the room. The writing was small and stark against the page. Pando was sure that he had read it a thousand times. Right now he wanted to hear Aatenel read it, in case it would reveal something new. "I think we _did_ read it correctly."

Pando opened his mouth and stopped to sputter while Yarrow pulled a thick sweater over his head. He coughed and glared when his head was finally free. Yarrow blinked serenely at him and started working the criss-crossing ties at the ends of the sleeves.

"I would have remembered being invited to his searing divinity's bedchamber, Aster."

"I don't think it's _ritual_ sex," Aster explained. She pointed again. "This, here? This says _And should two hearts become one, let them bloom._ I thought it was just making fun of us, haha, look at the Expanse, they're obsessed with plants, but..."

Pando stared at her. He could feel the blood draining from his face. Aster let her voice trail off. Ignoring them entirely, Yarrow knelt at the ground and put Pando's feet into boots.

"Are you telling me," Pando said, his voice distant, "that the fire deity responsible for saving our kingdom is genuinely attracted to me?"

Aster put the papers in her lap and held up both hands, palms out.

"I need to sit down," Pando said.

"What does he look like?" Yarrow asked, pushing a chair up behind him.

"Indescribably handsome. Also blue, with white hair. You'll probably meet him at dinner. I suppose. I have no idea if he eats." Pando inhaled. In his lap, his hands curled into fists. He was thinking of Aatenel's face. When he pulled back, after the definitely actually ritual kiss. When he had knelt during the definitely not ritual interruption to the ceremony. When he had frozen, after learning Pando's childhood name.

Yarrow patted his knee. "Do you want to hear what my parents told me when I married Willow?"

"I would rather die," Pando said, reflexively. He put his face in his hands and groaned. "I told him my old name."

Aster cleared her throat. "Does he... know the reference?"

"He made it very clear that he does."

"It could be worse." Yarrow shrugged when Pando looked up from his hands. "He could genuinely _dislike_ you. You could have been ritually consumed by flame at the end of the ceremony."

"Thank you, Yarrow."

"Always happy to help."

"It could be worse," Aster said, with a little emphasis. They both turned to her. She shrugged. "All of the noble houses, the guild heads, and the lead clergy have approved the union. We've already moved past the grumbling about tying the Expanse to a corporeal god. It'll end the generation after you, when the tributes stop, anyway. What is anyone going to say when we get back and tell them? Oh, we didn't expect the marriage to be consummated?"

"Aster, that is exactly what I would have said half an hour ago."

Yarrow pressed a cup of water into his free hand. "You could just tell him you didn't think he'd, uh, want you."

Instead of responding to that, Pando forced himself to slowly drink down the water. His head didn't feel any clearer.

He tried to imagine telling Aatenel that the possibility of being desired had been so far out of his consideration that it hadn't occurred to him once. That it had been such an alien concept that it hadn't occurred to any of his advisers, not once. That it had never even come up while the Expanse argued with itself about whether this was worth it, about whether they could back out, about whether giving Aatenel greater purchase in this world would be something future generations would regret.

'Hello,' he imagined himself saying. 'My people are so unused to gods with bodies that we didn't once think you might actually want to use yours. Especially not with me, apparently. I promise we are all cleverer than this suggests.'

"I feel like that wouldn't go over well," he said, grimly. "Can you refill this with wine?"

"No. Eat these figs, they'll be good for you."

Pando groaned but took the bowl of fruit.

***

At dinner, Aster leaned over to whisper in his ear. "He _is_ indescribably handsome."

Yarrow was just watching their host with large eyes over the rims of his glasses. He kept looking at Pando and raising his eyebrows. Pando was trying not to spend every other moment sighing or sliding down in his chair.

In a fit of self-assurance he no longer felt, he'd tried to convince the priest sent to fetch them for dinner that he needed five minutes alone with his husband first. Unfortunately instead of Vahiol, it had been Peyagh, who insisted that Aatenel could not arrive before the designated time and that it was not traditional for the spouses to have a private moment before the reception.

Pando had said, "We had quite a few private moments in the primary temple," and Peyagh had replied, "You weren't spouses then."

So there had been no private moment and all his bravery had left him. What had he been hoping for, anyway? Some kind of reassurance that this wasn't all a mistake? Confirmation that this was all a necessary part of the ceremony or simply something that Aatenel desired? He had been turning it over endlessly in his head and couldn't understand what it was that Aatenel wanted from him. Every interaction they'd had so far had been surprisingly physical, from Aatenel's obvious delight in surprising Pando to the kiss at the altar.

But it was like his brain threw up a wall when he considered anything further.

"Is he still staring at me?" he asked, letting himself look around the room.

The members of the Expanse travel contingent, consisting of himself, Aster, Yarrow, a doctor, a hunter, five guards and two travel guides, were all seated together on a stage at one end of a long room. Aatenel and two priests, including Laryssa, were seated on a stage at the opposite side.

Aatenel wore the same clothes he had greeted Pando in, but his hair was pulled back from his face with two braids. Pando had been supplied a matching orange wrap for his shoulders, but the rest of his clothing was a cool gray-green, which he supposed was a nod to the Expanse itself.

"He just waved at me," Aster confided. She tentatively raised her hand and waved back. Pando shot her a look from the corner of his eye and she lowered her hand. "Oh, no. Pando, it's even worse when he smiles."

"Yeah," Yarrow whispered. "You are totally fucked. But like, in a good way?"

"Please stop saying words," Pando begged him.

Fortunately the long table they were seated at meant that Aster and Yarrow were on either side of him and none of the rest of the group could hear what they were whispering to each other. 

There were a few Expanse citizens, nobility and guild representatives, who had bothered to make the trek up here to witness the post-wedding dinner and were in the crowd below. He was dreading the moment dinner was taken away and he needed to walk around and receive them.

What was he going to say? Oh, yes, he had definitely meant to truly entangle the Expanse with a country that worshipped a corporeal god. Those yearly offerings they had already started to plan with various crafts guilds were still necessary. Also, their king might be personally entangled with said corporeal god, and he had assured his family that they didn't actually need to travel all the way to Thaniol for the ceremony because it wasn't real. There was no way that even a corporeal god would take a genuine interest in him. It was all ritual.

His mother was going to kill him.

Eventually the food was taken away. As soon as the last plate was cleared, all three people on the opposite stage rose to their feet. Pando kept his eyes down. He suddenly couldn't remember what he had eaten or how much, but he didn't feel hungry. Trays of tall glass flutes were passed around, filled with a sweet-smelling rose-colored alcohol.

 _"Please arise to toast the long and prosperous union of his searing divinity and his royal highness, king of the Expanse,"_ Laryssa announced.

The rest of the crowd rose, and Aster cupped a hand on his elbow, gently urging him to his feet.

_"We toast in celebration of the good grace of his searing divinity."_

Everyone raised their glasses and took a sip. Most of the Expanse peoples in the crowd were just a beat behind everyone else, following the motions without understanding the words. He glanced up and met Aatenel's eyes from across the room. Aatenel didn't seem to be drinking, but he watched as Pando took a careful sip from his glass. The alcohol fizzed on his tongue.

 _"We toast in celebration of the arrival of his royal highness,"_ Laryssa continued, which was not nearly as good a toast. _"We toast this blessed union and all it may provide to Vrae and to the Expanse."_

It was hard to tell from this far away, but Pando thought that Aatenel smiled when the crowd sipped their drinks.

Then Laryssa repeated it all in root tongue, so this time his people understood what they were toasting to. Pando had thought the translation would be simultaneous but supposed that this worked just as well. He was feeling slightly fuzzy by the end of the six sips. He set his glass down at the end and resolved not to take any more of it. When he raised his eyes Aatenel stood on the other side of the table, smiling. From the way both Aster and Yarrow pulled back, Pando guessed he had just appeared out of nowhere.

He wondered if it had been in a puff of smoke and was mad that he had missed it.

 _"We should make your rounds,"_ Aatenel told him.

Pando let out a breath and stood. "Please met Aster and Yarrow, my closest advisers," he said, gesturing at his friends. They both inclined their heads to Aatenel, who paused for a moment before returning the gesture with a slight nod. Pando finished introducing his retinue before walking around the edge of the table.

They descended the few stairs together and Aatenel offered his arm. Pando hesitated before giving in and taking it. He found himself pulled snug to Aatenel's side as they began to walk.

How long did it take to get used to this heat?

 _"I don't understand your naming conventions,_ " Aatenel commented. _"Surely there are many others named Yarrow, or Aster. There are only so many plants."_

 _"Of course. As I am sure there are many Vahiols,"_ Pando said, which made the corner of Aatenel's mouth turn up. _"But if they were not my friends, or if several Asters were present, I would also use their second and third names. Yarrow's full name is Yarrow Alle Cral."_

 _"There is no other Pando?"_ Aatenel supposed.

 _"No."_ Not strictly. Not in the way that he was asking.

Aatenel steered him around the far edge of the room so they came to rest at a table of priests first. Peyagh was there, in low murmured conversation with another man, nursing his glass of the sweet toasting alcohol. There was a slight crease in his expression when Aatenel introduced his _new husband,_ but he stood and bowed to them the same as all the other priests. There was no more time to argue that an outsider sat among them, now.

Everyone was very formal. Pando felt slightly off. Surely they had all known Aatenel since ... since they were children? Even children prayed.

The first few people they met from the Expanse were members of various guilds, ones in the schedule to provide future offerings. Pando gently disengaged his arm from Aatenel's grip so he could shake hands.

 _"None of your people call you king,"_ Aatenel murmured, settling his hand low on Pando's back.

They were slowly making their way between tables. _"Pando is the same."_

Aatenel gave him a curious look, but then a trade minister was standing to greet them. Every time they had approached a new Expanse citizen, Aatenel had fallen back on smiling silently.

The trade minister glanced at Aatenel, clearly having geared herself up for witnessing his full shining beauty up close. "And, your _divinity,"_ she said, carefully - Pando was impressed she had learned the Vrael word for it. "How are you this evening?"

Aatenel, the traitor, turned to Pando and raised an eyebrow, like he hadn't understood a word she'd said.

"His searing divinity is a-" Pando realized he shouldn't say _man,_ but _god_ also felt strange. He rerouted. "He is of few words. But I promise he's enjoying himself immensely," he said. That earned him another fond look from Aatenel and his hand getting squeezed very tightly.

They walked away. Pando deliberately guided them the long way around to the next person trying to catch his eye. _"Are you pretending not to speak root tongue?"_

_"I just like watching you talk."_

_"My people are going to think you're mute."_

_"Does it matter so much what they think?"_

_"Yes!"_ Pando clenched his jaw for a moment. _"They are the Expanse,"_ he said, sure it was falling flat in Vrael.

At the next table sat Igneous, one of the highest ranking members of the Interior, which meant that he worked at maintaining a natural level of wildfire and had personally commanded crews at the edges of the one threatening the Expanse's very existence. Igneous was third-generation Interior, and his family was considered to be a little odd, at least in their choice of names, but was generally well-liked.

"Pando," Igneous said, rising to his feet. He held out both hands and Aatenel reluctantly loosed his grip on Pando's arm to let him return the handshake. "We're very pleased to see you tonight."

"Igneous. Marimo," Pando said, inclining his head to Igneous's wife. "I'm glad that you could make it." He hesitated, then said, "Aatenel, Igneous and Marimo are part of the Scorch's fire control team. They both manage the annual wildfires and were there when Els Chasm first erupted."

Both of his citizens looked curiously at Aatenel, waiting for a response. Igneous had burn scars left over from Els Chasm up and down his arms, which made his occupation rather obvious. When Pando had first met Marimo, years ago, she'd had chin-length black hair. Now it was buzzed short. She'd told him once that after it all got burned off it hadn't yet felt worth growing back. Another gift from Els Chasm.

It had been long weeks until the Vraens had come bearing Aatenel's flame to beat back the thing inside Els Chasm. Pando had toured, after, in between meetings with the Vraens about the marriage contract. He'd been to their home when Igneous had been unsure if he was going to lose one of his arms and Marimo hadn't been able to speak from smoke damage to her lungs.

Aatenel looked at both of them and then bowed his head, deeply. "My respects," he said, in root tongue. "And my apologies. I assure you that Els Chasm will be extinguished before the end of the season."

"We have faith," Marimo replied.

Pando privately thought that was better than what he would've been able to come up with.

They left a minute later, heading back to the Expanse's table at the other end of the room. They walked for a moment before Pando glanced up at Aatenel, who had not retaken his arm. _"That was kind of you."_

 _"I'm not mute, husband,"_ Aetenel said, dryly.

 _"Marimo used to have two eyes,"_ Pando murmured. _"Els Chasm took one."_

Aatenel stopped, staring down at him.

Pando struggled to figure out how to explain. _"My people are the Expanse,"_ he said, feeling helpless. It made more sense in root tongue.

 _"I'm going to fix it, Pyracantha."_ Aatenel pressed a kiss to his mouth. Not trusting himself to speak, Pando looked away. Heat receded as Aatenel leaned back slightly. _"Peyagh will walk you to my chambers. I need to close the celebrations."_

 _"Very well."_ Pando called a practiced smile to his face. _"I'm going to check on my retinue,"_ he said.

Aatenel turned, took one step, and reappeared on the other side of the room.

No puff of smoke. Just a seamless reappearing. Pando found that he needed to take a deep breath before returning to his table.

Behind him, Aatenel said several words that Pando couldn't quite catch. His head was too muggy and he was concentrating on making his way back to his table. The air took on a charged warmth and the torches on the walls stretched and turned white. He paused on the last step up to the Expanse's stage and turned to find everyone on their feet. The Vraens all had a touched expression on their faces. Aatenel said something else, but Pando couldn't make it out, not through needing to watch the Vraens' reactions to the words.

Then Aster's hand was on his shoulder. Across the room, Aatenel descended his stairs.

Pando realized he had lost the last moment.

He looked down at her and she briefly touched his cheek. "My door will be unlocked tonight. Yarrow's too, if you need us. He does seem to be a ... loved god," she said, hesitantly, a worshipper who'd never prayed to ethereal forces in physical form.

"I think I'm out of my depth, Aster," Pando whispered.

***

Pando said goodnight to the rest of his retinue and was waylaid several times over by guests on his way to the edge of the room. Eventually, though, he was forced to confront the fact that he not only had to walk to Aatenel's rooms but also had to do so with Peyagh, who he'd be perfectly fine ignoring at a cordial distance for the rest of his life. He was sure the feeling was mutual.

All he wanted to do was lean against the wall and shut his eyes for a few minutes. A short moment to be in his own head, alone, before he had to figure out how to measure up against Aatenel in his own bedroom.

"This way," Peyagh said.

 _"I am somewhat fluent in Vrael,"_ Pando answered before he could stop himself.

That wasn't a particularly royal or divine remark to make. It wasn't as if Peyagh could actually do anything to him, besides be annoying. Maybe he wasn't even annoying. Maybe it was all Pando's anxiety, projected.

"This way," Peyagh repeated, gesturing.

Aatenel's chambers were apparently in a high corner of the divine palace, far away from any of the common areas. There were several staircases to take and they passed by any part of the palace that Pando had already been able to tour on his own. This area was far from where guests might be staying, or even where priests might be treading.

There were also the four armed guards outside the door to contend with.

Pando inclined his head to them. They were all looking at him rather curiously - none of them had been at the celebration, or at least not in this leather armor, carrying wicked-looking blades and spears, each - but none of them spoke.

"Perhaps you are unfamiliar with personal guards," Peyagh said, once they were through the door. "They protect the way to his divinity's chambers."

 _"We have guards in the Expanse. I could ask that they join the others at the doorway. Should I have some doubt about the security in his divinity's palace?"_ Pando asked.

Peyagh turned slightly red. _"We are here,"_ he said, finally using Vrael.

The short hallway terminated at another set of doors. These were tall, wooden, and plain. They reminded Pando of oversized versions of the door that had lead up to Aatenel's primary temple, the private chamber where he'd been... ten hours ago, now? Less? Nothing suggested that all of this had taken place in one day and yet there was no alternative. He'd woken up that morning and now he was here outside Aatenel's personal door.

He raised his hand to knock and thought better of it. _"Thank you for showing me the way. You're dismissed, Honor Peyagh."_

The priest stared at him.

Pando raised an eyebrow. _"I am more than capable of greeting my husband on my own."_

There was no way to argue with that, although for a moment it looked like Peyagh was going to try. There was probably some small ritual greeting that he was supposed to impart. He finally set his shoulders and bowed before turning and leaving. Pando waited until he was through the far doors and the hallway was both empty and closed before turning and touching his hand to the door.

It swung open as his knuckles grazed the wood. Aatenel grinned, baring his teeth. Had he just been waiting there? Was he able to hear things through walls? _"You dismissed my third-highest priest,"_ he said, hand curling around Pando's wrist.

It would be a good moment to raise his eyebrow again, but Pando was distracted. Aatenel had pulled his hand up to press a kiss to his knuckles.

_"Do we require his services? Should I have the guards summon him back?"_

_"Get in here, husband,"_ Aatenel said, pulling him through the door.

***

It was difficult to place the feeling Pando had when he wasn't immediately set upon and ravished inside Aatenel's chambers.

It did give him a moment to look around. Aatenel had a sprawling sitting area. Narrow windows were cut into the walls on either side. Pando hadn't realized it during the trek upstairs, but they must be at the top of a tower somewhere. There was a sunken fire pit in the middle of the room, flickering lowly to itself. Low, long benches curved around it, piled with cushions. Opposite the entrance was another door, which must lead into the bedroom.

_"Were you able to hear us speaking through the door, or are you simply aware of everything your priests say?"_

_"I have a limited mental connection with my priests when they aren't praying,"_ Aatenel said, sounding amused. He led Pando over to one of the couches. There was a small wooden table next to it, sporting a gold platter with fruit, cups, and wine. _"Is there anything else you want to know? Do your own gods not answer such questions?"_

 _"I've never thought to ask the autumn storms such things,"_ Pando said. He could get used to Aatenel smiling at him, and oh, wasn't that a dangerous feeling. He accepted a cup and looked into the swallow of wine as if it might assist. _"Can you hear my thoughts?"_ he asked. He thought he knew the answer - or else their conversation was about to take a dramatic turn - but it would also be good to know for sure.

For some reason he didn't think Aatenel would lie to him.

Aatenel shrugged and lowered himself onto the couch, spreading both arms along the back. _"No. You've never prayed to me."_

Pando stared, momentarily speechless. "I have," he said, drifting back to root tongue.

His feet were in the crumbling soil of the hills outside Els Chasm. Soot stained his hair, his clothes, his lungs. It had been mere hours before the first meeting with the Vraen priests. Before there had been any talk of devotion, or offerings, or marriage in exchange for assistance. Pando had walked, alone, until the ground grew hot underneath his feet. And then he had knelt and prayed.

Aatenel made a noise, glanced up and then back down again. _"You prayed to me as you understood me. Not as one would pray to a god he expected to encounter, but as a force beyond the world. I am very much of the world, Pyracantha."_

 _"But you heard me?"_ He set the cup down without taking a drink. He was going to have to figure out how to address the name thing.

Aatenel watched him start to drift around the room but made no move to pursue. _"You caught my attention,"_ he said, softly. _"My priests had already lit ritual fires at the meeting place, so I could listen in on the negotiations. You were nearby. I felt you, even if I couldn't make out the words."_

Pando glanced out the nearest window. They were very high up indeed. The palace had been on a hill in the city, but from here, he could see out across the skyline to the next mountaintop. It was dusted with snow. "I didn't know a word of Vrael then," he admitted, shrugging with one shoulder.

"May I ask a question for a question?" Aatenel asked, seamlessly dipping into root tongue.

Pando gave another shrug. He realized he must look silly. He had his hands clasped together behind his back and couldn't stop surveying the room. Not quite pacing. Just. Looking around. Aatenel had a narrow bookcase filled with scrolls, of all things. There was a plant on top of the shelf with thick, succulent leaves, a dull deep red with tiny spines. He didn't recognize it and he wanted to touch it, but he would've had to take the pot down from the shelf.

"Do you want me?" Aatenel asked.

It was very difficult to break eye contact with Aatenel, once he had made it. He froze, his chest constricting, until some part of his brain was able to make him say, "I - You are not unattractive."

Another slow smile. _"Does that sound better in root tongue, Pyracantha?"_

Pando was distantly aware that he was red-faced and that it was unbecoming, but that was a difficult reaction to suppress. He gripped his hands tighter behind his back and forced himself to walk a few steps back toward the couch. It was ridiculous to need that much space between them. He wasn't afraid. Just - He'd been obsessing about how to raise this topic and now that it was here, he found himself at a loss.

"I haven't frequently found myself in a position where I could freely consider wanting someone," he finally tried.

"You and I are in equal positions."

Pando gave him a stunned look. "You're a god."

"You're my husband. You may recall that I vowed to return your devotion threefold," Aatenel drawled. He paused, smiled to himself, and leaned down to take the wine Pando had discarded. "You wear a blush so handsomely, Pyracantha. One would think you were surprised to find yourself here."

"I had been under the impression that this would be more of a ritual marriage," Pando admitted. He was never going to tell Yarrow that he'd actually done that. "It didn't occur to me that you might be interested in anything else."

"Ritual. It could be." The god regarded him from the couch, sipping the wine he'd poured for Pando, sprawled out against dark blue cushions. His head tilted just slightly so Pando had the clear feeling that he was being slowly looked over, drunk in, while Aatenel finished the wine in his cup. "I'd much prefer to be able to touch you."

There had been so many details hammered out between their countries. Pando had read the contract a thousand times. Words in careful script slammed into him and fell apart at Aatenel's curious regard. They had agreed on certain things that didn't seem to fit, not here in this room, with a bed ten steps away.

The Scorch had never asked for his devotion and had never returned it, even though he'd thought it beautiful before it had been razed to the ground. The autumn storms came faithfully every year, probably unaware that they rained upon worshipers. Devotion was respect paid because it was owed. He might ask a tree-forest for shelter but would never expect it to request a kiss in response.

"I have to remain in the Expanse, once the fire is extinguished. I'm duty bound. I have no successor, yet."

"I have no problem with you remaining in your kingdom. You still intend to make a yearly pilgrimage and offering, yes?"

"Of course." It had been in the contract. A lot of things had been in the contract. "But don't you - I mean. Once a year?"

Aatenel smiled at him. "Time is different for gods."

Pando didn't want to admit that the thought of only having sex once a year was a little depressing.

"You look worried."

"I don't think I understand."

Aatenel looked off into the distance for a moment, considering, then asked, "Do you think, when I visit the Expanse, that the Vraens will be without their god?"

"I... have been made to understand that your power is far-reaching."

"The priests will carry a piece of flame from my primary temple to the Els Chasm, allowing me to make a manifestation." Aatenel watched his face and was apparently dissatisfied with Pando's comprehension. Gesturing to the fire pit, he said, "Pyracantha, I'm a divine being of flame. I exist wherever fire does. Or, I potentially exist, with the correct prayers, if I'm not already in my own territory. I can manifest in multiple places at once."

Pando said, "Oh."

Aatenel leaned forward and murmured, his voice just barely carrying the distance, "You are permitted candles in your royal bedchamber, yes?"

"Yes." He was deeply aware that he was being teased. Somehow, it didn't feel that bad.

"I will teach you the prayers. I would very much like to visit." He put the empty cup down and stood. He crossed the remaining space between them and raised one hand, trailing two fingers along the line of Pando's jaw. "You never answered my question, Pyracantha. Do you want me?"

"Are you ever going to call me Pando?" he asked, sighing, and in the same motion turning his head to kiss Aatenel's wrist. It was absurd that it felt daring. He had already been kissed, publicly, several times today. But Aatenel's skin was hot against his mouth and when he glanced up the god was watching him hungrily.

Aatenel's other hand slid onto his back and he pulled Pando so close their stomachs pressed together. "I might be convinced. Some day," he said, his voice dipping slightly.

"How gracious, your divinity. Should I have included that in the contract?"

Aatenel had been moving to kiss him and stopped to let out a laugh. Pando reached up to slip his hands under Aatenel's shirt - risky, daring, _fuck,_ his skin felt so good under Pando's fingers - and blinked wide-eyed, innocent.

"I have a problem, I think," Aatenel murmured. He let Pando's hands move over him and tilted his chin, his eyes shutting briefly when Pando surrendered to an impulse to kiss his throat. "If I gag you, I can't kiss you. But your mouth is already so distracting."

"What would be the threefold return on allowing myself to be gagged?"

Aatenel let out a hiss of a breath. _"This comes off you, now,"_ he said, curling his fingers up in the fabric of Pando's shirt.

Pando opened his mouth to say something, but suddenly Aatenel's hand was running over his bare chest. His mouth clicked shut. Whatever retort he'd had evaporated. Aatenel's fingertips trailed down the center of his chest, over his stomach, just grazing the trail of dark hair that led down past his hips.

_"So this is what it takes to make you speechless?"_

He had to say something. Aatenel was watching him, smiling. He had to say something. Preferably he needed to answer in Vrael, but that required remembering vocabulary, and... _"I suppose I didn't know what to expect from a god."_

_"If you had, I would've had questions about how the Expanse worships autumn storms."_

Pando was struck with a sudden knowing. If he didn't maintain an equal footing here, Aatenel would sweep him away. He would let himself be swept away, because right now all he wanted to know was the right combination of words to use to make Aatenel do it. His lips parted reflexively when the god kissed him and he already found himself being devoured, walked backwards and pressed against a warm stone wall. He clutched at Aatenel's sleeves, grasping for an anchor in the whirlwind. They were nearly of a height. Pando was let up for air and turned his head just slightly, so Aatenel's mouth found his jawline. It had been. It had been some time since he'd been kissed like. Since he'd been kissed. No one had ever kissed him quite like this.

He turned his head again, pressing their foreheads together. He had no idea how to read those featureless gold eyes, but he was rewarded with a low rumbling sound when he tangled one of his hands in Aatenel's hair, the braid starting to loosen under his fingers. He lowered his eyes slightly and hoped he looked as debauched as he felt, or this wasn't going to come off right. 

_"And yet, my divinity, I believe you did not plan on revealing yourself to me before the ceremony."_

_"I didn't know you. You in the Expanse are used to gods without bodies."_

Pando blinked and found himself glaring. _"Did you think I would be scared, like a child?"_

_"You did leap backward upon seeing me."_

_"You deliberately caught me off guard."_

Aatenel grinned, baring his teeth. _"Such defiance. You make cold use of that pretty mouth."_

No one had ever told him he'd had a pretty mouth. Did Aatenel want...? He briefly bit his lower lip and Aatenel made that rumbling sound again. Fuck. He needed to pull himself together or he would do anything to keep that look on Aatenel's face.

He felt worshipped. Was this what that felt like?

_"Do you have any other questions for me, Pyracantha?"_

It occurred to him suddenly that he did. _"What does 'blissfully exhausted' mean?"_

Aatenel blinked, startled by the subject change, and then started laughing. It was a huge, deep, laugh that rolled right through the both of them. He stole a rough kiss from Pando at the end of it, his teeth scraping Pando's lips. _"Who smuggled you smudged novels?"_

Pando huffed, exasperated. _"I don't know what that means either."_

 _"Smudged novels are, ah,"_ Aatenel considered for a moment, glancing up. When he looked back down Pando realized he was being teased. _"I believe you would call it erotic literature."_

Those had been texts Pando had studied on his own, at night, to learn more about Aatenel without the filter of his Vrael tutor. Passages about divine spouses experiencing the ecstasy of searing grace suddenly took on a different light.

 _"Blissfully exhausted,"_ Aatenel explained, _"is what you're going to be when I'm done with you tonight. But the phrase is rather archaic, so you probably shouldn't use it in public."_

Pando glared at him. _"I assure you I'm not going to do that."_

 _"Good,"_ Aatenel said, kissing him again. He pressed the hard edge of his hip against Pando's. _"Bed, husband. Now."_

 _"Are you going to teach me to pray to you there?"_ Pando asked, instantly, the semi-sarcastic way he would have spoken to Yarrow. 

The tone must not have translated because Aatenel groaned and was suddenly sweeping him up. He pressed a kiss against Pando's jaw and Pando realized they had _moved._ The mattress was soft and yielding underneath him. In comparison with everything else in these chambers, the sheets were cool against his skin. It was a very clear feeling as none of the rest of his clothes seemed to have come with him.

 _"Could've had you to myself for a year now, Pyracantha,"_ Aatenel growled against his throat. His teeth scraped Pando's skin and he laughed when that elicited a sharp gasp.

The bastard was still wearing all his clothes. Pando tugged at the orange wrap around his shoulders and, smirking, Aatenel allowed him to pull it off. _"Even if I'd come here a year ago, you would still be negotiating, not wishing my clothes away,"_ he argued.

_"Are you sure about that?"_

Pando latched onto the bottom of Aatenel's shirt. The god obliged, slightly, sitting up and moving back. He batted Pando's hands away to lift his shirt above his head himself. He must have tossed it onto the floor, or waved it away, Pando wasn't sure - Aatenel's clothing had hid strong shoulders and a lean torso, and it was distracting.

 _"I wouldn't have fallen into your bed with one kiss,"_ Pando insisted, at the same moment he leaned forward to kiss Aatenel's chest. The heat nearly stung.

Aatenel made a satisfied noise and ran his fingers through Pando's hair. He cupped the back of Pando's head and tilted his face up, the strength in one hand enough to hold him still. Pando sucked in a breath, ready to protest, and found himself being kissed again. Aatenel slid his tongue into Pando's mouth and bore down on him. He moved one knee between Pando's legs, to keep them apart, and rocked forward, the hard still-clothed plane of his thigh rubbing against Pando's cock.

He was hard, already, and Aatenel indulged him, letting him jerk his hips and rub himself against Aatenel's thigh. He grabbed the side of Aatenel's face and tore away from the kiss, half to suck in air and half to snarl at him, _"Why am I the only naked one?"_

 _"You would've fallen for me. I would have made sure of it,"_ Aatenel said. The rest of his clothing did disappear, though, so all of a sudden his near-searing skin was flat against Pando's cock. Aatenel hissed when Pando's fingers dug into the back of his neck, but he didn't pull away. _"Do you want to come before I fuck you, or during?"_

Pando managed to get one elbow under himself so he could sit partway up. It had been so long, and no one had ever done this. (Obviously, he didn't make it habit to bed people who could vanish clothing with a thought.) No one had ever looked at him and said, _mine,_ as if it would have always been a forgone conclusion. No one had ever bled _need_ all over him like Aatenel was doing now.

The god reached a hand down between them and stroked his fingers along Pando's cock. It made it difficult to string a coherent thought together.

 _"Pyracantha,"_ Aatenel rumbled. _"Are you too overcome to answer me?"_

Pando grasped desperately at his lessons, at all his practice, at the careful conversation he'd had so far. It felt like water in his hands. Aatenel was too hot to the touch, too close, too much. The whirlwind was on top of him, rough friction on his skin, fingers teasing the end of his cock, all his weight keeping Pando firmly pinned to the bed underneath him.

 _"I,"_ he started, faltered, tried again. _"I simply -_ fuck, I mean, I-"

Aatenel laughed. "No, no. I like this. We can use root tongue," he said. He grinned. "I'll make you come, first. Maybe it'll bring your speech back."

Later Pando was going to think of some way to respond to that. Later.

He reached past Pando to a table next to the bed. Pando had a brief moment to actually observe the room. Large, high bed with pale sheets. Wider windows that looked onto more mountain views. A chest in one corner, a fireplace, and Aatenel's hand, coming back, having successfully plucked a small vial of oil from next to the bed.

It was no surprise that the oil was warm against Pando's ass, or that Aatenel was able to work him open in a matter of moments. He teased with shallow thrusts at first, then curled his other hand around Pando's cock. His thumb rolled precome down Pando's skin. Three fingers pushed into him, rough, out again and forward, just the barest strain of rhythm to it, a thread to hang on by. 

Pando bit the inside of his cheek, hard, trying not to shout. It felt like he was on the edge of having his vision flare out. 

"You think I wouldn't have wanted to find out what you looked like while I did this?" Aatenel asked, drawing his fingers out slightly. "If you'd shown your face here last year, like I asked, do you think we could have traded ten words before I would've planned this?"

"If - If you like my mouth that much, are you planning on - on using it?"

Aatenel's eyes flashed. "Later," he promised. "Do you have your words back already? Should I stop?"

Pando swallowed thickly and brought his hips up, desperate. His shoulder strained and he realized he'd stretched his arm behind his head and his fingers scraped at the headboard. Aatenel made another satisfied noise. There was suddenly a post for Pando to wrap his hand around. That made it easier to lift his hips. Aatenel's hands moved together, pushing into him and working his cock, and then it all was too much.

It was a near thing, but his vision didn't flare when he came. He did get to see the small, satisfied smile on Aatenel's face. He didn't let up as it rolled through Pando, several waves, Aatenel smirkingly allowing Pando to spill come over his hand and wrist. He made a hoarse noise that might've been _aat'l,_ from the expression on Aatenel's face.

That was enough to make him fall back against the mattress. He let go of the headboard and was treated to the sight of Aatenel licking the come off his palm. For a long moment he just watched, while his body settled. 

"Turn over for me."

Pando breathed out. "Are you sure you don't want my mouth?"

Aatenel's eyes closed slightly. Pando propped himself up. Aatenel was hard, had probably been hard for several minutes. His cock was thick, a darker blue at the crown, already slick with precome.

He stayed still when Pando rose and leaned over, nearly but not quite kissing him. "I've been told flattering things about my mouth," Pando confided. 

Another flash in those golden eyes. "Have you?"

Pando did kiss him, then. Aatenel opened his mouth. He tasted like heat and spice, and Pando latched onto his shoulders. They kissed until he needed to breathe - that was becoming a pattern.

"Yes," he said, breathing deep, fingers digging into Aatenel's shoulders. "I've gotten a lot of compliments."

"I think I'm going to fuck your words out of you again, Pyracantha."

Pando shuddered. Heat flashed through him. For a split second he waited to be _moved_ again, like before, but there was no magic, no sudden spinning of the world around him. Just Aatenel staring. He inhaled and touched a knuckle just under Aatenel's chin. He lowered his voice. "I'm teasing, Aatenel. You're the one who's spent so much time commenting on me."

"Is that so?"

Pando kissed him again, slow, coaxing, until Aatenel's tongue was in his mouth. The stark gentleness of it made him want to push Aatenel down and wrap his lips around his cock. He wanted to know how long Aatenel would be gentle with it, or if he'd end up fucking Pando's mouth, if it'd be deliberate or a crack in his control.

Aatenel groaned and twisted his head away. "When you concentrate that hard on something I can _feel_ it," he hissed.

He blinked, then grinned, picturing Aatenel spilling in his mouth and himself swallowing it all down.

"Turn over," Aatenel said, grabbing his hips. "I need-"

Pando just laughed and twisted around. He'd revisit that later. Breaking that smug exterior for a moment had been worth it. He settled on his knees and pulled a pillow flat to rest his elbows on. That turned out to be hopeless. Aatenel was gentle, for a moment. He kept one hand on Pando's hip and pushed his cock in slowly.

He had braced himself for being stretched but he hadn't expected the rush of heat rolling through him. Aatenel's cock was wide and Pando felt full while he was still pressing forward. It occurred to him that Aatenel was going slow on purpose but he couldn't find it in him to comment. By the time Aatenel had pushed all the way in, his hips pressed to Pando's ass, Pando's forehead was pressed against the pillow and only Aatenel's hand on his stomach was holding him up.

Aatenel bent over to kiss his shoulder blade. He shifted his weight, making shallow thrusts at the same time he eased Pando down against the sheets.

"Ritual marriage," Aatenel murmured in his ear. Pando shivered and Aatenel bit his ear. "Mmm. It really didn't occur to you that I might want this?"

"You didn't-" Pando clicked his teeth together, sure that sudden thrust had been on purpose. "You communicated through your priests for the entirety of the negotiations. I d-didn't think you could be interested."

Aatenel paused just long enough that his next thrust forward pushed the breath out of Pando. "You were far away and I am not overly fond of traveling. And I was annoyed you wanted to postpone."

"You did get an additional generation of offerings after my rule out of that postponement," Pando said.

"Hush," Aatenel ordered. Pando made the mistake of laughing and got another nip to his ear for the trouble. 

Then Aatenel curled a hand over Pando's shoulder and began to settle into a kind of rhythm, one rough enough to have Pando's hips lifting off the bed and his body being forced back down when Aatenel buried himself as deep as he could go. Pando struggled to maintain a grip on the sheets for the first minute, and hissed when Aatenel shifted his weight to press the hard length of his cock against his prostate.

"You're going to burn me," he groaned, his forehead falling to the bed.

Aatenel's free hand drifted over his back. The light touch of hard nails and that alien sixth finger made Pando jerk. "No," he said, sounding distracted. "I can't burn you, firethorn."

"Don't."

"Don't what?"

"Don't call me that." Pando managed to get up onto his elbows and nearly gasped when Aatenel's hand slid from his back to his stomach, pulling him up onto his knees. God - Gods? - _Fuck,_ anyway, he was so huge. "That's not what it - It's not that kind of f-fire."

Aatenel laughed. He laughed! The only thing worse than him laughing was that Pando realized his own cock was hard again. _Fuck,_ again.

"You come from a kingdom that insists on naming all your children after growing things. It's a plant that spreads like fire and bites you if you come too close," he said. He thrust especially hard, so Pando groaned. There was the distinct sound of popping firewood in his voice next: "Feels like you were made for me, your majesty."

Pando couldn't find it in himself to argue. He did shoot a simmering look over his shoulder and manage to coax Aatenel into pulling out for a moment. Aatenel inhaled when Pando shoved him against the headboard and settled onto his lap. His head fell back, white hair completely loose now, when Pando lowered himself back onto his cock.

It was easier, a little, this way. It felt like Aatenel was deeper but Pando was able to flex against Aatenel's grip and slow the pace somewhat. It put him in a prime position to drop possessive kisses over Aatenel's throat. Also, it meant his cock was rubbing against Aatenel with every thrust, every time they moved apart or came back together. It was almost embarrassing how quickly he came.

He had to drop his head to Aatenel's shoulder for a moment and just breathe.

He inhaled and focused on Aatenel, present, physical, _corporeal_ underneath him, inside him. The slick feeling of come on his stomach - their stomachs - and the smooth sheets under his legs. Which, he realized, were trembling slightly from strain.

He blinked, raised his head, and the thought must have crossed his face.

"I can keep going," Aatenel murmured. He dragged his hand down the flat plain of Pando's chest, his expression evaluating. "Do you require a respite?"

Pando pulled the god's hand off his skin, twisted their fingers together. That still-alien sixth finger stretched to press against the meaty part of his palm.

"I am - I am _devoted,_ " he said, his accent exceedingly formal as he clutched at the Vrael word for it, which meant far more than it suggested in Pando's own language. Simple loyalty versus an all-consuming dedication. A willingness to offer everything.

The use of it made his husband's gold eyes turn briefly white around the edges. It was hard not to smirk.

"I'm not human," Aatenel said. As if a reminder were needed. He brought Pando's hand up and kissed his knuckles. "I'd be happy to fuck you for the rest of the night."

Pando knew his eyes had widened by the way Aatenel laughed. Internally, he flailed, lost. His free hand he brought up to brush against Aatenel's stomach, which made the god's lips part slightly. Then he carefully raked his fingertips up Aatenel's chest and, finally, over his shoulder, to curl around the back of his neck. At the last moment he moved to press their foreheads together, like that strange moment during the wedding, making sure to roll his hips as he did.

_"Am I not enough for you now, aat'l? Is my devotion not clear?"_

Aatenel abruptly pressed his mouth against Pando's. Pando had been expecting that, so he parted his lips, teasing one of Aatenel's sharp canines with his tongue, until Aatenel seemed to reach some breaking point. He brought a hand up to run through Pando's hair. A snarl emanated from his chest when his fingers found no long locks to tangle in - Pando briefly wondered if a request to grow his hair out, Vraen-style, was in his future - but then Aatenel was pulling his head back and thrusting his tongue into Pando's mouth.

At the same time he buried his cock in Pando's ass, and Pando ended up gasping around Aatenel's tongue when the god spilled inside him. He expected it to burn. It was hot. It did send heat sweeping through him.

But it didn't burn.

***

"I should have your language tutor's tongue," Aatenel hissed, nipping at Pando's ear. Pando looked at him through half-lidded eyes, too tired to protest. "What other sweet things were you taught to whisper to me, firethorn?"

They were sprawled out side-by-side on the sheets. Pando was on his stomach, one arm folded underneath his head. Aatenel leaned back. He was propped up on one elbow, looking down at him. There was a dark mark on his throat and another on his chest. Pando wondered if he realized it. He remembered sucking at Aatenel's throat. He didn't remember biting his chest, but there was quite a bit that was a blur, honestly.

"If I had visited last year, you wouldn't have been able to hear me saying such sweet things," Pando murmured, deliberately stretching his legs so that his thighs spread. He was sure he looked a mess, but Aatenel's eyes reflexively darted down to where his skin was coated in come. "Didn't you say you could have lasted the rest of the night? Was I too much for you?"

Aatenel snorted and pressed his mouth to Pando's throat. "You blasphemer," he said. His teeth pressed warningly against Pando's neck.

Pando privately thought it sounded like he was trying not to laugh. He didn't feel very warned.

"Do you know what Pando means, divinity?" he asked.

He'd been thinking about it. Well. He'd considered it for the last few minutes, the amount of time it had taken for Aatenel to stretch, leave the room, and return with the wine from the parlor. It had still been cold. He did wonder how Aatenel pulled that one off.

Aatenel reluctantly drew back. He nearly brought their foreheads together. With his long hair undone, it fell in a wave against the side of Pando's face. "I suppose you're going to tell me, your majesty."

"It means 'I spread,'" Pando murmured. Aatenel moved to kiss him and he brought his hand up to cup his jaw, keep him back a couple of inches. Aatenel's skin warmed against his but he held still for the moment. "It's the name of a tree-forest that's existed in the Expanse since before people did."

Aatenel raised one eyebrow. "I don't know this word, tree-forest."

"It's a single tree. One root system. Instead of sending its seeds into the wind, it stretches out beneath the soil and sprouts its own saplings. They grow to full height and do the same. It's in the furthest corner of the Expanse. Not many visitors go there."

"Are you warning me that I shouldn't discount your people? I have no plans to do so."

Pando half-smiled. "Pando is so old that our kings and queens always take its name. It's our way of paying respect." He briefly paused, then added, as if in afterthought: "It's an atlan. It grows broad, flat leaves. In the fall they turn translucent. When the sun or moon is overhead, they glow."

"Pyracantha," Aatenel murmured. "Is this story better than kissing you?"

"Patience," Pando said, which made Aatenel snort. He brushed his thumb over Aatenel's lower lip and got a swipe of tongue for his affection. "I'm trying to explain why you should really be calling me by my right name."

"And why is that?"

"Imagine a thousand-acre tree-forest, glowing. At noon it's a glare visible for miles. The earliest peoples to the Expanse recognized it as a deity. In cavern tongue, they called it _Radiant,_ which Vrael would translate as-"

"Burning," Aatenel said, the room suddenly hot. He pressed himself against Pando.

"So, you see," he started.

 _"Pando,"_ Aatenel said, directly into his ear. Hearing his name, his proper name, made him shudder. Aatenel had said it in a different accent. Something rough. Considering how old he was, it may have been how the word was originally said in cavern tongue when the tree-forest had been named. He strained for some answer to it and was pressed down into the sheets instead, Aatenel's mouth hot on his own.

He was starting to get tired, but he kissed back. He thought he might understand what _blissful_ meant, soon.

**Author's Note:**

> I stole the king's name from a real tree called Pando, which is an ~100-acre colony consisting entirely of clones of one quaking aspen tree, and which is assumed to have only one root system. It is also known as The Trembling Giant. Pando means "I spread out" in Latin.


End file.
